Free market niche = profitability of a business on it?

Why do we burn

Often, novice entrepreneurs face the problem of finding a promising and profitable business, but in our time the market for many goods and services has long been oversaturated. But nevertheless, businessmen, moving and hustling among the already obvious market leaders, open enterprises and crowded into the market “crowded” with competitors.

It is difficult and rare, but sometimes they are lucky, and the business goes up, but more often such rash or sudden steps lead to the collapse of the business. Therefore, before you open and start your own business, you need not only to look at the market, but also to study it in detail.

Everything seems to be simple, but even now I am observing a trend in the IT market, when customers order something like that with “pearl buttons”, but at the same time the market is already suffocating from oversaturation. The question is: “Why else are you needed there?” But if we are talking about a custom project, then we do not forget the rule - “The client is always right” and we give him what he wants.

IT market

If clients come to me, then most often they want something specific: a website, a specific Internet service, or implement their specific idea for an Internet business. Naturally, I will not persuade them that you should not climb where there is nothing to breathe without them.

As for their internal projects, before their creation, of course, the entire market and its volume, competitors, and opportunities are studied in detail.

Since I am well acquainted with the IT market, I wanted to share my experience in creating one very necessary project, but unfortunately this experience was not as sweet as we would like.

Clear sky

It is difficult to believe that now you can become the only "participant" in any market, and even that your business will become profitable.
Having found a free niche in the market, I realized that I urgently needed to fill it, and, of course, become the first and only.
We are talking about the process of registering trademarks and their preliminary verification. When you come across this, you understand how complicated it is, long and expensive. In the State Services, a preliminary check is 2 weeks and 800 hryvnias, if your version of the name TM is busy, another 2 weeks and another 800 hryvnias and this can last indefinitely. Only after a successful search for a free name for your trademark begins the registration process, which lasts even longer and costs even more, but it can not be avoided.

Having decided to make life easier not only for myself, but for many other entrepreneurs, I realized that the preliminary screening process itself is a mere trifle that is turned into a headache and rip off money.

My team has developed an Internet service that allows you to check the brand name of existing and already registered TM in Ukraine in one minute. The database is fully consistent with the database of Ukrpatent. And, of course, the price: the cost is extremely small - 32 hryvnias per check.

Not as sweet as I wanted

Everything seems to be just wonderful - both the service is needed and the price is affordable, everyone is happy. Of course, there were some mistakes and problems, but still - the service is ready, it works - just use it.

We evaluated the market quite simply: about 1000 people per month register trademarks. We claimed 50% of the market. With simple mathematical calculations, we get - 500 users per month.
We calculate the income: 500 times 32 hryvnias (the cost of one TM check) and we get 16 thousand hryvnias per month. Agree, not so bad for a startup.

The market, although it was empty, but turned out to be very narrow and specific, for this reason, a frenzied influx of customers was not observed.
Also, I suppose that the case may be in ignorance and not enough trust in the service. Not all businessmen have the time and opportunity to rummage through the Internet and follow the latest Internet services.

To promote - not to promote?

You ask: “And to promote the service?”, Of course, this is exactly what we did, but investing a lot of money in advertising is completely pointless, since the cost of the service is low and even with a large number of customers it will not be profitable.
Perhaps someone will offer to raise the cost of the service, but in this case, people will doubt the use of the service, since it is one thing to lose 32 hryvnias, the other - 200, and here you have the trust.

We also introduced promotion in social networks, on various thematic forums and portals, but again we ran into the problem of “narrow target audience”, very few people really need it, and who needs it, then there is already problem number two - not knowledge and distrust of Internet services. Often, the psychology of people how it works: “I don’t see who I’m paying money to and I don’t see the goods, which again I can’t“ touch it ”, which means they will most likely“ throw me ”for money.”
Sadly, there are many such users.

Another problem in our Internet service was that the payment process itself was inconvenient. Few people had the opportunity to pay using webmoney. After which we introduced the ability to pay via SMS, here we are waiting for the result.

Morality

Our mistake turned out to be that we didn’t go in the right direction to promote and promote the service, now we “PR” it only where our potential customers are or may be.

Before embarking on a project, especially if it is a startup, you need to study this market in great detail, and both sides are sure to: both competitors and consumers; adequately assess their possible share and only after drawing up a competent marketing plan to draw conclusions - to implement / not to implement.

In any case, the service paid off the investment in its development and even makes a small profit, of course, not what I had hoped for at the beginning, when it was created.